 23. The first decade of politics. During the decade immediately following the establishment of state government in California, politics never attained a very high level. Only a lukewarm interest was taken in national affairs except as an action of Congress or the President promised to affect some matter of local concern. Even in the workings of their own state government, the people showed such little interest that political control passed almost entirely out of their keeping into the hands of a few skillful, energetic man whose bitter rivalry for control of party machinery added an exciting though unedifying element to the otherwise monotonous course of local politics. Curiously enough, the first California legislature had met, performed its duties, and adjourned almost a year before California became a state. The capital had temporarily been fixed at San Jose by the Constitutional Convention and here the two houses met on December 15, 1849, with 16 members in the Senate and 36 in the Assembly. In footnote, each legislator received $16 a day during the session with an allowance of the same amount for every 20 miles traveled to and from the state capital. The chief work of this legislature consisted in drafting a code of laws, providing revenue to meet the government's immediate needs, and electing William Gwynne and John C. Fremont to the United States Senate. The body also attained a certain unique position in the state's history as the Legislature of a Thousand Drinks, a name which owed its origins, so it is said, to the oft-repeated motion of Senator Thomas J. Green, late of Texas, to adjourn and take a Thousand Drinks. The chief issues in state politics after the government was in actual operation included the location of a permanent capital, a conflict of interest between the mining counties on the one hand and the agricultural and commercial sections on the other, the grievances of the south against the north, especially in connection with the levying of taxes, appointments to office, and apportionment of public funds. The question of state aid for stage and immigrant roads across the mountains, the sale of waterfront lots in San Francisco, the difficulty of enforcing law, and the protection of frontier counties from Indian depredations. The permanent location of the state capital caused considerable stir both in the Legislature and among the rival cities contesting for the prize. San Jose and Monterey were the best known of these, but two as yet in embryo cities also offered their appeal. One of these, called by its sponsors New York on the Pacific, made up in name what it lacked in size. The other, like the ancient city of Nehemiah, was large and great, but the people were few and the houses not yet building. The site of this second prospective capital was attractive land on the straits of Carcanese belonging to General Baillel. The latter offered to donate 156 acres to the state for public purposes and within two years provide $370,000 in cash for the erection of buildings if the capital should be located on the proposed grant. A popular election authorized the change from San Jose to Baillel, as the new site was called, and after a good deal of wrangling and some further offers from Baillel the Legislature accepted the general's proposal. When the Legislature came together in January 1852, however, some six months after Baillel had agreed to provide proper accommodations for its sessions and living quarters for its members, they found that none of these things had been done, nor was Baillel able to live up to the other obligations he had undertaken. So the state government, after much confusion, handed bag and baggage from the Carcanese metropolis to Sacramento. It was not until 1854, however, that this city was made the permanent capital. When it became known that the government proposed to move to Sacramento, the people of that city chartered a river steamer, the Empire, to convey the members of the Legislature to the new scene of their labors. The departure from Baillel was thus described by a humorous and disrespectful correspondent of one of the contemporary newspapers. Quote, Bright and early, therefore, the next day, the whole town was in commotion. Carpets were torn up from the floor, stoves and the long stove pipes came down on the run, the china chairs were tumbled in a heap out of the state house and carried in homogeneous masses on men's heads down to the wharf. The barkeepers, finding their occupation was gone, decided to stick by the Legislature as their only safeguard, and decanters and tumblers, bars and bar fixtures, stout and bidders, silver twirlers and champagne baskets went pell-mell into the confusion and down aboard the boat, mixed in with the Legislatures, judges and private gentlemen who merely came along to see what the two houses were doing. The barber put his razor, his indiscriminate hairbrush, and his supply of one towel into his pocket, shouldered his chair, and marched down to the Empire also. Here and there, only, was a long face marking some spectator who was gazing bewildered in the turmoil and saying to himself, Fallen is Vallejo, Vallejo the Magnificent. While in the midst of the confusion the shrill notes of the washerwoman were heard, who was hurling elegant epithets against everything in general, the gay deceivers of the Legislature in particular, and now and then interlarding her remarks with moral reflections touching unpaid bills, etc. The rivalry between the mining and agricultural districts of the state was a far more serious affair than the question of the location of the capital. The friction, indeed, which arose out of this conflict of interests, especially that created by the question of taxation, was largely responsible for the frequent efforts at state division attempted during this period. For a while San Francisco and other non-mining sections in the north had in some degree the same grievances as the south, yet the latter suffered far more keenly from the unjust burdens of taxation and the unequal distribution of state favors. Even as early as the Constitutional Convention, a group of southern delicates had favored state division and sought the establishment of a territorial government for the counties they represented. In doing this they were actuated largely by the fear that the south, with its relatively scant population and its large land holdings, would be compelled, if united with the north, to bear a disproportionate share of the state's financial burden while having but little voice in its government or share in its political rewards. This fear, fed also in some degree by the traditional antipathy of south to north and inherited from the old days of Mexican control, found ample justification as the state government got underway. In Governor McDougal's annual message of January 7th, 1852, he pointed out that taxation throughout the state was in no sense proportionate either to population or to representation in the legislature. The six southern counties, with a population of approximately 6,000, annually paid to the state $42,000 in taxes on real estate and personal property. The 12 counties chiefly devoted to mining, which represented 120,000 persons, escaped with only $21,000. In poll taxes the southern counties contributed nearly $4,000 to the state treasury. The mining counties, though assessed over $50,000 under this form of tax, actually paid only $3,500. Yet the southern counties, which combined, paid twice the taxes of the mining sections, had only 12 representatives in the legislature, while the mountain counties sent 44. Figures of a similar nature were compiled from time to time by southern newspapers for the benefit of their already disgruntled constituents, and as a protest against the manifest injustice of the tax and representative apportionments. Quote, The overwhelming influence of the north in the legislature is seen in every act which has been passed within two years, said one Los Angeles newspaper in 1851. The northern counties are engaged almost entirely in mining and contain very little land liable to taxation. As a consequence, the burdens of taxation fall principally upon the south, burdens which our people are poorly able to bear. Quote, Another southern paper declared that the injustice, quote, worked by this unequal apportionment will account for the almost unanimous feeling of the southern people in favor of a separation from the north and the establishment of a territorial government. Quote, Again, the stars sarcastically remarked that the legislature at Sacramento never gave a thought to the insignificant cow counties of the south until it became necessary to raise additional revenue for state purposes. Nor was the dissatisfaction confined to the question of taxation and representation alone. The non-mining sections north as well as south were united in the feeling that the mining population and their representatives at the capitol were ignorant of the state's needs and lacked interest in its welfare. Quote, They make laws for their own government, said the daily Alta and speaking of the miners, and in all things live, move and almost think separately and apart, as though no bond of connection or sympathy existed between their interests and those of the commercial cities and other sources of wealth in our infant state, end quote. But while the non-mining counties in the north felt in some degree the injustice of these matters, they at least were able to secure sufficient benefits from the state in the form of appropriations, special legislation, and appointments to public office to offset whatever inequalities they complained of. And as time went on, their growth in population enabled them also to obtain a fair degree of equality of representation with the mining counties. The south, however, found no such compensation for its grievances, and for at least a decade continued to agitation for a division of the state. In 1851 this movement reached such serious proportions that a convention to divide the state of California was summoned to meet in Los Angeles on November 10. The call to this convention summed up the viewpoint of the south thus, quote, Whatever of good the experiment of a state government may have otherwise led to in California, for us of the southern counties it has proved only a splendid failure. The bitter fruits of it no county has tasted more keenly than Los Angeles. With all her immense and varied natural resources, her political, social, and pecuniary condition at this moment is deplorable in the extreme. Her industry paralyzed under the insupportable burden of taxation. Her port almost forsaken by commerce. Her surplus products of no value unaccounted the enormous price of freight. Her capital flying to other climes. A sense of utter insecurity of property pervading all classes. And everything tending to increase and fasten upon her in the guise of legislation a state of actual oppression. Appray to the incessant Indian depredations from without and destitute of internal protection for our lives and property under laws as applicable to our wants and the character of the population. And with all a continued ruinous taxation impending over us. Our future is gloomy indeed as a community if we shall fail and disappear to our brethren of the north for the only redress consonant with our mutual interests. A separation. Friendly and peaceful but still complete. Leaving the north and south to fulfill their grand destinies under systems of laws suited to each. The signers of this document were Augustine Olivera, Pio Pico, Benjamin Hayes, J. Lancaster Brent, Lewis Granger, John O. Wheeler, Jose Antonio Carrillo. Though the movement of 1851 accomplished no practical end, the southern counties continued in a desultory fashion to talk of state division until 1859. The failure of the government at Sacramento to check the lawlessness and crime everywhere so prevalent in the state or to provide any adequate defense for the exposed communities of the south against Indian phrase added to the irritation and discontent engendered by other grievances. Some southern residents may also have cherished the faint hope of establishing a pro-slave territory if the state should be divided, but the force of this motive was of minor significance if indeed it ever had any real existence. By 1859 conditions seemed favorable for the south to accomplish its long cherished purpose. A bill proposing state division was presented by Andreas Pico and the legislature, and on April 18th that body gave its consent to the formation of a separate government for the five counties of San Luis Obispo, Santa Barbara, Los Angeles, San Diego, San Bernardino, and a part of Buena Vista. These were to be erected into a territory called the Territory of the Colorado, or by some other name the citizens might select. But in order to become effective it was necessary for the proposed measure to receive a two-thirds vote in the counties affected as well as a sanction of Congress. As the last requirement had not been met before the Civil War broke out, the measure died a boarding. During this decade, unfortunately for the later history of the state, political morality was so lax and legislative standards so low that inefficiency and corruption became a sort of traditional heritage of the California legislature for many years to come. The details of individual cases of graft and dishonesty of 70 years standing are of no great significance today, but this early surrender of the state to those who sought only personal profit or advantage from political control said an unfortunate precedent whose consequences later decades had difficulty in escaping. Many of the newspapers were outspoken enough in their criticisms of the government during these years, but little good seems to have come from such attacks. The legislature of 1851, to cite a random example, was spoken of by one of the San Francisco Papers, an infamous, ignorant, drunken, rowdy, perjured and traitorous body of men. The Daily Altacalifornian, an Oregon of the Independence, rejoiced that the legislature of 1852 would rectify the evil done by its predecessors and, quote, rescue the state from the labyrinth of imbecility, vagueness, and iniquity into which it is strayed with scarcely a clue by which to retrace its erring steps or life and strength enough to vindicate its honor and punish those who have shamelessly abused its confidence, end quote. For many days, however, according to the same writer, the new body gave unmistakable evidence of following the old system of combinations, arrangements, pledges, promises, log-rolling, scheming, and swapping of votes, which had characterized its predecessor. These charges were doubtless exaggerated, but trustworthy records, not only of these two sessions, but of nearly all other meetings to the legislature during the decade, testified to the low political standards at the time. Federal issues figured but little in the state's politics, though parties were organized along national lines and voters nominally cast their ballots as wigs, no-nothings, or Democrats, depending chiefly on their previous party affiliations east of the mountains. There was also a small group of independents who occasionally held the balance of power between the regular parties, but while this group could sometimes determine the choice of rival candidates, it was rarely of sufficient importance or well enough organized to fill state or national offices with its own men. The regular parties were under a machine control that recognized no shadow of popular responsibility. The Democratic Party, especially, which dominated the state during all but a year or two of the decade, when the no-nothings held a brief supremacy, was led by a group of shrewd dictators who regarded the state as a sort of private preserve for their own political advantage. The struggle for supremacy among these self-constituted leaders furnished the chief element of excitement in state politics until the Civil War, and it culminated in the bitter feud between Broderick and Gwynn, which disrupted the Democratic Party and prepared the way for Republican control. William M. Gwynn was a Tennessean by birth, a physician by education, and a politician by instinct and deliberate choice. His early career had been determined very largely by his close association with Andrew Jackson, who whatever may have been his faults seldom neglected to advance the political interests of personal friends. Gwynn, accordingly, had acquired a certain reputation in Tennessee and Mississippi before the close of the Polk Administration. But when the gold rush started, he set out for California, resolved to assume the leadership of politics in the new state and secure a seat in the United States Senate. Gwynn's ambitions were quickly realized, for in the first legislative session after the adoption of the Constitution, in the framing of which he had played a prominent part, he was elected to the United States Senate for the full term of six years. As the most conspicuous of California's representatives at Washington, Gwynn served his state with more than ordinary success, and at home built up a constituency that seemed to render his position permanently secure. His supremacy, however, did not long go unchallenged. David C. Broderick, of New York, son of an Irish stonemason to which trade he himself had been apprenticed as a boy, reached California shortly before Gwynn's election to the Senate and began at once to organize a rival political machine. Broderick, like Gwynn, came to California with the purpose of realizing certain definite political ambitions. Like Gwynn too, he was already trained in practical politics before he reached the Pacific, but his education along this line had been very different from that of his southern opponent. For while Gwynn represented the traditions and practices of the Democrats of the Southwest, Broderick had learned his art in the shrewdest of all political schools, the Tammany Organization of New York. To the training thus acquired, he added a native aptitude for controlling men, an aggressive determination, and a contemptuous disregard for the methods and traditions of the older school of politics. In the rivalry between these two men, the bitterest and most intense in the history of the state, Gwynn found his chief support among the southern and western Democrats in California. His followers were commonly dubbed the chivalry wing, or more popularly the shivs, and were supposed to hold aristocratic ideals of government, as opposed to the more democratic conception of Broderick supporters, most of whom were men of northern extraction. Gwynn's followers were also charged with pro-slavery views, and as Gwynn himself has frequently been styled the arch-champion of the slave-holding interests in California, the Gwynn-Broderick fight is often explained as a contest between the pro-slavery and the anti-slavery forces of the state. As a matter of fact, however, the issue was not so much one of principle as of personal ambition, and neither Gwynn's attitude on the Negro question nor Broderick's much affected it either way. Gwynn's chief advantage, aside from his reputation and established leadership in state affairs, lay in his monopoly of federal patronage and his control, because of this, of a very effective political machine in which federal office-holders played an important part. Broderick, on the contrary, though almost shut off from this source of influence, succeeded in building up a powerful following both through the organization of municipal politics in San Francisco and Sacramento, and by the adroit use of state patronage and the manipulation of nominating conventions for state offices. One of the most notable encounters in the struggle for supremacy between these two men came in the legislature of 1854. Normally the election of United States senator was not due until the session of 1855, but Broderick, thinking he controlled the situation, sought to force the legislature then in session to proceed with the election. This plan almost succeeded, but after a bitter and at times an apparently losing fight, the Gwynn faction finally defeated the maneuver and deferred the election until its regular time. In the contest, it is needless to remark, both sides resorted to every means, legal and illegal, at their command, and the money spent to influence the legislative vote ran far ahead of anything the state had ever known before. The bitterness engendered by this fight naturally led to a widening of the breach in the Democratic Party. The next state convention, which met in Sacramento, broke up in confusion, and for a time, since most of the delegates were armed, it looked as though a pitched battle would certainly result. The next day the two factions held separate conventions and each put its own ticket into the field, thus apparently assuring success for the Whig Party in the fall elections. The latter party, however, was not able to take advantage of its opportunity, and the election returns gave the Gwynn candidates a decided majority in the legislature. But Broderick was by no means put out a California politics by this defeat. With a persistency and shrewdness seldom equalled, he continued his struggle for the state's mastery, and after throwing the legislature of 1855 into a deadlock over the senatorial election, he succeeded in re-establishing his control over much of the party machinery throughout the state. The continued schism in the ranks of the Democrats was largely responsible, however, for the victory of the Know Nothing Party in the election of 1856. But this victory left Broderick in a much stronger position when the triumph of the Know Nothings came to an end in the following year. In the legislative session of 1857 the senatorial election was again the absorbing issue. In this contest Broderick proved strong enough not only to secure his own election, but in some degree to dictate to the legislature the choice of his colleague. For Broderick's unquestioned authority forced Gwynn into a compromise with his formal rival that might be well called the bargain and corruption episode of California politics. Under the terms of this agreement, which was arranged in a secret interview between Gwynn and Broderick personally, the latter undertook to secure for Gwynn the election to the United States Senate, and Gwynn on his part pledged himself to turn over to Broderick his monopoly of federal patronage in the state. In previous years this has been Gwynn's chief political asset and a prize greatly sought after by his rival. The first provision of the compromise was successfully carried out. Despite universal astonishment, much aggrin and vigorous denunciation of the bargain, Gwynn accepted the senatorial election from Broderick's hands and even went so far as to publish in the newspapers a formal renunciation of any part of the federal patronage. The question of appointments to federal office in California, however, was not thus easily disposed of, for President Buchanan did not take kindly to Broderick or his recommendations and filled various important positions in California with men to whom the new senator from the coast was opposed. Coupled with this issue of the federal patronage was Broderick's opposition to Buchanan's course and the heated controversy over the slavery issue in Kansas. Broderick vigorously opposed the Lecompton Constitution to which Buchanan had definitely committed himself so that the breach between the president and Broderick was still further widened. As an upshot of the situation, Broderick returned to California in 1859 out of favor with the administration and unable to reward his followers with the federal appointments to which they had so confidently looked forward. His return to the state a few months later was the signal for a renewal of the old feud to which the bargain of unsavory reputation was supposed to have made an end. The quarrel was pursued on either side with bitter vindictiveness. Each man besmirched his own reputation in order to injure that of his opponent. But public opinion, strangely callous to these open confessions of corruption, failed to drive either of the guilty senators out of politics. It was not long, however, before Broderick's career came to a tragic close. As a result of certain charges made by Broderick against Judge David S. Terry of the State Supreme Court, one of Gwynn's staunchest supporters, the latter resigned his position and challenged Broderick to a duel. The challenge was accepted and the two men met on the morning of September 13th, 1859, in a little valley in the hills of Marin County, not far from San Francisco. The weapons chosen were dueling pistols and the distance thirty paces. Both men were known to be excellent shots. Broderick had participated in at least two similar encounters in early stages of his career, but at this time his health was undermined and his nerves badly upset by the long continued strain of the campaign through which he had just passed. Consequently he was severely handicapped in the duel and fell an easy victim to Terry's well-directed aim. Broderick's own shot, though fired first, entered the ground barely nine feet from where he stood. The death of Broderick, in some respects like that of Hamilton at the hands of Burr, aroused public opinion as the man himself had never succeeded in doing while alive. Though Terry escaped any legal consequences of his act, his name has not escaped the infamy, which justly or unjustly it incurred because of Broderick's death. More important still, at least from the political standpoint, the death of Broderick reacted disastrously upon Gwynn. The breach between the two wings of the Democratic Party was now too wide for any possible reconciliation. And as Broderick's followers had all along opposed Buchanan's policy in Kansas, most of them joined with a newly formed Republican organization to bring about the overthrow of the long-continued Democratic domination of the state. This occurred in the election of 1860. In California, as in other states, the campaign of that year was complicated by the confused condition of federal politics. The Democratic Party, divided between the Douglas and Breckenridge factions, with many of the former adherents also voting for Lincoln or Bell, could not stand against the growing power of the Republicans and the four electoral votes of the state went for Lincoln. With the approach to the Civil War, a critical situation arose in California. The isolated position of the state and the lack of close political or economic ties to bind it to the rest of the nation created a feeling of indifference among most of the Northern sympathizers regarding the outcome of the great contest in which the national government was involved. A numerous foreign element in the population further accentuated this attitude of aloofness. On the other hand, there was a large and influential body of citizens of southern birth and sympathies that actively worked to bring about the secession of California from the Union. It was not expected, nor even desired by this party, however, that the state should formally join the Richmond Confederacy, but they hoped by reviving the old plan of a Pacific Republic to weaken the North through the withdrawal of California's important financial and moral support. The Southern sympathizers also looked to see the new Republic serve as a source of supplies for the Confederacy, and it was expected that privateersmen would outfit along the coast for attacks upon Union merchantmen. More important still, the plan promised to divert the badly needed silver and gold bullion of the California and Nevada mines to the southern states. The plans of the Confederate supporters were not defeated without the most vigorous efforts by a few of the state's loyal citizens. The Union of many of the Douglas Democrats with the Republicans broke the political power of the chivalry or Gwynn faction, and so took most of the state offices out of the hands of the southern sympathizers. The fealty of the federal troops stationed in California was also assured when President Lincoln superseded Albert Sidney Johnston, then in command of the Pacific Division of the United States Army, by General Edwin V. Sumner. But the real purden of keeping the state true to the government fell upon a relatively few Union men whose intense earnestness and loyalty were largely instrumental in arousing public opinion against the secession movement. San Francisco was the headquarters of this Union group. Here great mass meetings were held and a secret organization formed known as the Home Guard to prevent secession. Thomas Starr King, Apostle of the Union cause, toured the state in a remarkably effective campaign to arouse the spirit of loyalty. The state legislature pledged its support to the Lincoln government. Thousands of volunteers enlisted in the state militia for home defense. Money was freely raised by public and private subscription to meet the state's wartime obligations. More than a million dollars were voluntarily contributed to the work of the Sanitary Commission. Finally, some 15,000 men were enrolled from the state in various branches of the Union Army. Despite such efforts, however, the Northern supporters could not wholly undo the work of their opponents. Many Southerners, among whom the most conspicuous was Albert Sidney Johnston, made their way back to the Theater of War to join the armies of the Confederacy. Senator Gwynn, who had come to California shortly after Lincoln's inauguration, proffered his services to the Richmond government and sailed for Havana by way of Panama. After numerous adventures and some months of confinement in a Union prison, he finally reached Mississippi. Afterwards, he represented the Davis administration at the French court. More than one vessel, ostensibly fitted out for Mexican or South American ports, slipped away from California waters to prey upon Union commerce in the Pacific. In certain parts of the state, notably at Visalia and other cities of the San Joaquin, at Sonoma, and in the Santa Clara Valley, the secessionist feeling was far stronger than Union sympathy. In certain of these communities, the newspapers boldly championed the Southern cause. Confederate flags were everywhere in evidence, and military companies were organized to offset the efforts of Union sympathizers. Gorilla Bands, operating under the guise of Southern Irregulars, likewise interfered somewhat with the shipment of bullion through the mountains and caused some loss of property to the Northern supporters. The whole air indeed, during the four years of war, was full of the plots of Southern adherents to overthrow or injure Union influence. Many of these were too fantastic ever to succeed, but the isolation of the state and the indifference of the public mind made the situation one of real danger, even as late as 1864. Aside from the issue of secession and the change from Democratic to Republican control, the politics of California during the Civil War period showed no material change. Some measures of local significance were passed by the legislature, and various laws which profoundly affected the state were enacted by Congress. From the standpoint of public morality, however, the government of California underwent but little change from the low level to which it had fallen during the early fifties. Professional politics and public indifference still prevented any radical departure from the accepted policy of turning a public trust to private gain. Chapter 24 of A History of California the American Period by Robert Class Cleland. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 24. The Overland Mail and the Pony Express. Before the building of railroads, one of the most serious problems California had to face, from a social and political as well as an economic standpoint, was the development of some means of carrying on local and transcontinental communication. To supply this pressing need for transportation facilities, measures of various kinds were undertaken by unofficial bodies as well as understate and national direction. Road building was naturally regarded as one of the essential means of solving the difficulty, and it was undertaken both at private and public expense. In September 1854, for instance, the people of Los Angeles raised $6,000 for the construction of a wagon road between their city and Fort de Home. The work was completed in December of the same year. In 1855 the state legislature appropriated $100,000 for a road through Johnston's Cut-Off in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, $7,000 for a road from San Diego to the Colorado River, and $20,000 for the old Mormon road from San Pedro through the Cajon Pass to Salt Lake City. At about the same time, the federal government set aside $50,000 for the same road. Over it one of the earliest of the Overland Mail services to the state was inaugurated. With the increase of population and the building of roads, the transportation companies sprang up like mushrooms to meet the increased demand for more adequate service. Nearly all of these companies carried freight, passengers, express or mail as the opportunity arose. Many of them grew into large and flourishing organizations and played a very vital part in the upbuilding of the state. It is manifestly impossible to list any considerable number of these lines, but a few may be cited by way of illustration. In 1854, for example, the Adams Express Company began a monthly express service between San Francisco and Salt Lake City by way of Los Angeles. From the last named city, according to the company's advertisements, the route included the following settlements, Ilmonte, San Bernardino, Cold Creek, Johnston Springs, Perawan, Ked Creek, Fillmore City, Nepthee City, Summit Creek, Payson's, Provo City, and American Fork. The following year the California Stage Company added the line of stages to this route, and of more important still a very considerable freight business sprang up between the two cities. The service was all the more important because heavy winter snows ordinarily shut off communication between Salt Lake and St. Louis on the east and San Francisco on the west during a large part of the year, leaving the Los Angeles Salt Lake Road as the only means of outside communication for the Mormon settlements. As a result of this natural monopoly, the Los Angeles merchants profited greatly from the Salt Lake trade and build up a large trade between the two cities. An idea of the importance of this business may be gained from the fact that the single firm of Alexander and Banning frequently set out a train with as many as 15 ten mule teams transporting merchandise valued at $30,000 or $40,000. Freight charges over the route ranged from 18 to 25 cents a pound. While these local or semi-local lines were a material benefit to the communities they served, the most vital interest of California lay in the development of transcontinental means of communication. In the matter of mail service, for instance, for nearly ten years after the discovery of gold, with the few exceptions to be noted elsewhere, the people of the state were compelled to rely wholly upon the Pacific Mail Steamship Company. Although this company drew an annual subsidy of $700,000 for carrying a monthly mail between New York and San Francisco, it performed its functions in a most abominable matter if the literature of the time is at all to be relied upon. Even when the service was made semi-monthly in 1851, the southern part of the state still suffered most exasperating delays in receiving its eastern mail. Letters from New York were sometimes seven or eight months reaching Los Angeles. The Pacific Mail vessels frequently failed a stop at San Diego on either northward or southward voyage, but carried the Los Angeles mail from Panama to San Francisco and backing into Panama, with a fine disregard for the impatient citizens of the southern cities. Consequently, letters from New York sometimes required seven or eight months to reach Los Angeles. Footnote. In 1855 one of the southern newspapers stated that San Luis Obispo had had only eight mails in eighteen months. End of footnote. Naturally the people of the state were anxious to bring such a condition to an end, and very early began the agitation for a regular overland mail service to the east. Prior to 1857, however, only a few abortive attempts were actually made, either by Congress or private individuals, to inaugurate such a service. And from these efforts the people of the state derived little immediate benefit. The most ambitious of these early undertakings was that of Absalom Woodward and George Torpenning, with these men the United States government contracted in April 25, 1851, for a monthly mail service each way between Salt Lake City and Sacramento. The first route was along the regular emigrant road through Placerville, crossing the Sierras at Carson's Canyon, then following along the Carson and Humboldt Rivers and around the northern end of the lake to Salt Lake City. Thirty days was allowed for the 900-mile trip, and though this could be made easily enough in summer, the winter often found the route impassable, so that Torpenning was obliged to abandon it during several months each year and forward the mails to San Pedro by sea and then transport them overland to Salt Lake by the Mormon Trail. Indian attacks on the northern route were also frequent, so while a government subsidy which amounted to only $14,000 a year was afterwards increased and a shorter road opened between Placerville and Salt Lake through northern Nevada, Torpenning's project never gave very satisfactory service, nor repaid the contractors by several hundred thousand dollars for the expense and labor involved. One of the reasons for the slow development of the overland mail service was the very powerful and well organized opposition in Washington of the Pacific Mail Steamship Company to any rival carrier. The intense sectional jealousy between northern and southern California and between western and southern states over the location of the route was another retarding influence. Almost every immigrant trail running into the state had its backers, but eventually the contest narrowed down to three main routes. The first of these, much frequented by early immigrants, ran from Independence, Missouri, and later from St. Joseph to Salt Lake by way of Laramie, Fort Bridger, and the South Pass. Over the eastern portion of this route, from Missouri to Salt Lake, a monthly mail service was almost continuously maintained by various contractors after 1850. This supplied both the Mormon settlements in Utah and the United States military forces along the frontier. But from Salt Lake to California, this northern route was frequently impassable during the winter months as Jor Penning found by hard experiment. The second proposed route left Springfield, Missouri, and ran in a southwesternly course to the Canadian River. Following the course of this stream, it passed through Albuquerque and held almost directly west until it reached the Colorado. From the Colorado it continued to the Mojave and then turned northward to the Tahoe Pass. From the Tahoe, one branch led to Los Angeles, and another continued up to San Joaquin Valley to San Jose and San Francisco. This route, commonly known as the 35th parallel route, or Beals route, was apparently the most favored of the three by mail contractors. The southern route, which eventually obtained the government subsidy, will be described in detail later. It is sufficient here to point out that while considerably longer than either of the others, and running from much of the way through barren or even desert country, it had the great advantage of being open the year around and was consequently looked upon as the most available of the three by postal officials. Over this route a mail service was established from San Diego to San Antonio, Texas in 1857. Wynn quotes from the San Diego Herald this description of the departure of the first mail. Quote, The pioneer mail train from San Diego to San Antonio, Texas under the contract entered into by the government with Mr. James Birch, left here on the 9th instant, August 9, 1857, at an early hour in the morning and is now pushing its way for the east at a rapid rate. The mail was of course carried on pack animals as will be the case until wagons, which are being pushed across, will have been put on the line. The first mail from the other side has not yet arrived, although somewhat overdue and conjecture is rife as to the cause of the delay, end quote. The government contract with Birch, mentioned in the quotation, was only on a temporary basis pending the passage through Congress of the long delayed Overland, California mail bill. And in the closing hours of Pierce's administration, this measure, after a deal of wrangling, finally became law. Under the terms of the act, the postmaster general was empowered to select a route, determine the frequency of the service, and advertise for bids for the transportation of all letter mail from the Mississippi to San Francisco. The contract was to run for six years and called for a subsidy of $300,000 annually for semi-monthly service, $450,000 for weekly service, and $600,000 for semi-weekly service at the option of the postmaster general. Nine bids were made for this contract, but the award finally went to the Butterfield Overland Mail Company, a concern closely affiliated with Wells Fargo and controlled almost entirely by New York stockholders. The southern route was selected by the postmaster general, and St. Louis chosen as the location of the central depot of supplies. All sections of the country, as a contemporary newspaper pointed out, thus shared to some extent in the advantages of the contract. The route of the Overland Mail, as Butterfield's company came to be known, can best be shown from the following timetable printed in a newspaper of the period. San Francisco to Los Angeles, 464 miles, 80 hours, zero minutes. Los Angeles to Fort Yuma, 280 miles, 72 hours, 20 minutes. Fort Yuma to Tucson, 280 miles, 71 hours, 45 minutes. Tucson to Franklin, El Paso, 360 miles, 82 hours. Franklin to Fort Chadborne, 428 miles, 128 hours, and 40 minutes. Fort Chadburn to Colbertus Ferry on the Red River, 283 miles, 62 hours, and 25 minutes. Colbertus Ferry to Fort Smith, 192 miles, 38 minutes. Fort Smith to Tipton, 313 miles, 48 hours, 55 minutes. Tipton to St. Louis by Railroad, 160 miles, and 11 hours, and 40 minutes. Between Los Angeles and San Francisco, the route passed through San Jose, Gilroy, Bacheco Pass, Fresno City, Visalia, Fort de Homme, French Johns, San Fernando, and a number of other settlements which at the time enjoyed a reputation and a name. From St. Louis to San Francisco, the Posty John First Class Mail was three cents for each half ounce, three sacks of letters averaging 170 pounds in weight, and a newspaper bag of about 140 pounds were carried by each coach. These coaches were substantially built, and at a pinch could accommodate six passengers. From four to six horses or mules were attached to each coach. They traveled day and night running on a maximum schedule of 25 days for the one-way trip. This maximum time, however, was seldom required except where delays occurred from Indian attacks or flooded rivers. There was likely to be irregularity, however, in the mail service between Memphis and Fort Smith, and as the Butterfield stages picked up the southern mail at this point for conveyance to California, such delay sometimes interfered with the normal schedule. Probably the quickest trip on record was made in 1859, when the mail leaving St. Louis on September 16th reached Los Angeles on October 3rd, having been on the road only 17 days, 6 hours, and 10 minutes. The business of the Butterfield Company was conducted in a thoroughly systematic manner and on a very large scale. Nearly 800 men were in the employee of the company. The equipment consisted of more than 100 Concorde coaches, 1,000 horses, and 500 mules. Stations were built, wherever possible, at 10-mile intervals. These were ordinarily of Adobe, and the government allowed 320 acres of land for building and grazing purposes at each station. In sections where there was danger of Indian attack, a guard of 20 or 25 men was placed at each station to protect the company's property and to convoy the mailcoach through the hostile country. The fare from Memphis or St. Louis to San Francisco was $200. Passengers had to furnish their own meals, but were given facilities for preparing them at the company's stations. Each passenger was allowed to carry 40 pounds of baggage without cost. He was advised to equip himself for the journey with the following outfit, quote, one sharps rifle and 100 cartridges, a Colts navy revolver and two pounds of balls, a knife and sheath, a pair of thick boots and woollen pants, a half dozen pairs of thick cotton socks, six undershirts, three woollen undershirts, a wideaway cap, a cheap sack coat, and a soldier's overcoat, one pair of blankets in summer and two in winter, a piece of India rubber cloth, a pair of gauntlets, a small bag of needles, pins, etc., two pair of thick drawers, three or four towels, and various toilet articles, end quote. The overland mail was looked upon by all right-minded Southern Californians as a local institution, or at least as belonging principally to the southern part of the state. Northern California was somewhat chagrined at the choice of the southern route, and many of the state's east of the Rocky Mountains likewise felt aggrieved at the postmaster general's decision. For although a mail service was maintained between Placerville and St. Joseph Missouri by way of Salt Lake, and the line was supposed to run from Stockton to Kansas City by way of Albuquerque, neither of these could compete successfully with a Butterfield subsidy. Partly, therefore, as a result of this sectional rivalry, and partly to meet a real economic need, one of the most spectacular of Western ventures was set on foot in the spring of 1860. This was the famous Pony Express, more important, if the truth be told, from the standpoint of romance than of commercial success. The first trip of this new and short-lived enterprise was begun amid great enthusiasm. The San Francisco Bulletin of April 7th, 1860 contained this paragraph, quote, From one o'clock till a quarter to four on Tuesday last, a clean-limbed, hardy little nanking-colored pony stood at the door of the Altatelegraph Company's office, the pioneer pony of the famous Express, which that day began its first trip across the continent. The little fellow looked all unaware of his famous future. Two little flags adorned his head-stall, from the pommel of his saddle-hung on each side a bag-lettered, Overland Pony Express. The broad saddle, wooden strips, immense flappers to guard the rider's feet, and the girth that knows no buckle were of the sort customary in California for swift horsemen who appreciate mud. At a quarter to four he took up his line of march to the Sacramento boat. Personally he will make short work of the undertaking, and probably be back in a day, but by proxy he will put the west behind his heels like a very puck, and be in at New York in thirteen days from this riding. At three o'clock the letters he had to carry numbered fifty-three. Probably his whole cargo will be seventy-five or eighty letters at five dollars each. Those which use both pony and telegraph expect to be landed in New York in nine days after quitting San Francisco. The Pony Express riders were picked with the greatest care and represented the heartiest and bravest of western men. Each rider was provided with a complete buckskin suit with hair on the outside to shed the rain. He also carried one or more colts, six shooters, eight inches in length, and a knife eighteen inches long. Each man rode a stretch of one hundred miles, though on occasion riders were known to carry the mail three times the regular distance without rest or sleep. Eleven hours was the maximum time allowed for the hundred miles, and each rider was required to make at least four hundred miles a week. The Pony Express, except in the hardest weather, furnished a much more rapid service than the overland mail, but its charges were high. It had no government subsidy, and its route was subject to serious blockages by snow. This last difficulty sometimes furnished the good citizens of Los Angeles with cause for rejoicing. When, for example, in February 1861, the desk batches brought by the overland mail to Los Angeles were telegraphed to San Francisco, arriving there ahead of the Pony Express, a great celebration was held in the Southern Metropolis in honor of the overland mail and the Pacific and Atlantic Telegraph. Footnote. This line had been completed between Los Angeles and San Francisco since October 3rd, 1860 in footnote. And it may be remarked in passing that a celebration in the Los Angeles Society of the Sixties was always carried out with spirit and fervor, a large part of which whatever the occasion came out of kegs, bottles, and other containers of potential enthusiasm. With the outbreak of the Civil War, the Butterfield mail service, since it ran through Southern Territory the larger part of the way, was discontinued. Part of the equipment owned by the company was seized by the Confederates and part was sold to the Central Overland California and Pikes Peak Express, or COC and PP, a recently organized and very powerful company operating between Salt Lake and Atchison, Missouri. The remainder of the Butterfield equipment was used to establish a line between Salt Lake and Virginia City, Nevada. This last line was later run in connection with a pioneer stage from the Virginia City to Sacramento and with a COC and PP from Salt Lake to Atchison. A through mail and stage service from Sacramento to the Missouri was thus at last established. A daily mail service was soon operated over this route and a schedule maintained under which each coach made a minimum of 112 miles a day. The presiding genius of the new Overland line was a widely known Ben Holiday. Obtaining an annual subsidy of one million dollars for the transmission of through and local males between Atchison and Sacramento, Holiday enlarged his equipment, improved the passenger service, and extended his business so successfully that he finally had some 3,300 miles of stage lines under his control. In 1866 he sold his entire business to the Wells Fargo Interests, a company which had already gotten possession of the pioneer stage in the original Overland mail. In 1868 the government granted Wells Fargo a yearly subsidy of one million seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars for a daily mail service to California and under the incentive this subsidy stages were once more restored to the old Butterfield route. But the age of the railroad was at hand and the day of the Overland stage came to an end. It had served its purpose, however, by writing a new chapter in Western romance and by breaking down to some degree the isolation of a state. End of Chapter 24 Chapter 25 of A History of California the American Period by Robert Glass-Cleland This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter 25 Background of the Pacific Railroad On July 1st, 1862, when the nation was beset by the danger and stress of the Civil War, President Lincoln signed Bill entitled, An Act to Aide in the Construction of a Railroad and Telegraph Line from the Missouri River to the Pacific Ocean, and to secure to the government the use of the same for postal, military, and other purposes. Ten nights later the city of San Francisco gave itself up to a magnificent celebration in honor of an event for which all California waited with impatience, or despair, for nearly 15 years. A newspaper of the time thus described the jubilation. Quote, A multitude of flaring lamps and torches and blue lights with any number of banners, over 50 transparencies of red and white in other colors, fountains of yellow sparks bubbling up here and there, meteoric white and red and blue lights shooting hither and thither from Roman candles and rockets soaring high into the air, leaving long tracks of yellow sparks, and then bursting in many colored balls overhead. Thus the long and brilliant procession marched in a blaze of lights, while the air was thick with smoke and loud with the music of clamoring bands, shriekings of the steam whistle, and the thunders of cannons. Among the most interesting features of the procession were 50 or more transparencies born between the long lines of shouting people. From the wording of these inscriptions, it is possible to gather something of the spirit of the occasion. One read, Quote, The locomotive his prow is wet with the surge and foam of either ocean, his breast is grim with his sands of the desert. In Quote, Another bore these lines, Quote, A union of lakes, a union of hands, a union of states, none can sever, a union of hearts, a union of hands, and the railroad unites us forever. A slightly different theme, as well as a different literary flavor, was contained in such expressions as, Cape Horn be blowed, Salt Lake City, the halfway house, and Chesapeake Bay oysters, six days from the water. The boosting spirit was also much in evidence as appeared in California, a watering place of the world, and in the following not yet accomplished prophecy. San Francisco in 1862, 100,000 inhabitants, San Francisco in 1872, 1 million inhabitants. The Pacific Railroad, said another, Uncle Sam's waistband, he has grown so corpulent he would burst without it. But all the transparencies none better express the sentiment of the time than that which ran, Quote, The transcontinental railway, its construction no longer promised to our ear to be broken to our hope. In Quote. For in truth, the final enactment of the Pacific Railroad bill was the culmination of a long, vexatious, and at times apparently hopeless struggle. Beginning in 1832, with the publication of an anonymous article in The Immigrant, a weekly newspaper of Ann Arbor, Michigan, advocating the construction of a transcontinental railway, the idea of a road to the Pacific was brought forward from time to time by various visionaries until at last it found a real champion in the person of Asa Whitney. Whitney, fresh from two years stay in China, had an admirable genius for sustained enthusiasm. On January 28, 1845, he laid before the Senate the first of a long series of memorials dealing with the project of a line from Lake Michigan to Oregon. During the next eight years, he devoted his time and much of his private fortune seeking to educate Congress and the American public to think in terms of a continent. Whitney's plan, while providing for the construction of the road at private hands, called for the grant to the company of a strip of public land 60 miles wide and extending from one terminus of the line to the other. The land covered by this grant, however, was to be sold at a low figure to actual settlers, and the road itself upon completion was to become the property of the nation. This proposal, afterwards modified in some important particulars, aroused much popular interest and by the close of 1848 no less than 17 state legislatures, besides many unofficial bodies, had petitioned Congress for its adoption. The opponents of Whitney's plan, however, even from the beginning were about as numerous as its advocates. Their objections were based chiefly upon four grounds. The cost and difficulty of building any road across the continent, it was said, made the undertaking a stupendous piece of folly. The land grant sought by Whitney were a colossal robbery of the public. The enterprise ought to be taken wholly out of private hands and made a government affair, and, finally, the proposed route across the continent was much inferior to others that might have been selected. With public opinion divided by these various differences, it was impossible to expect Congress for many years to sanction Whitney's undertaking, or, in fact, to unite on any plan for the construction of a Pacific railroad. The chief disagreement arose over the question of routes, for nearly every section of the country looking to its own local interests advocated some particular line to the West and denounced other proposals as impractical or sectional. After 1850, however, upon at least one point, opinion was tolerably well united. It was generally accepted that the road should terminate in California instead of in Oregon, a change from Whitney's original plan made necessary by the acquisition of the Mexican war territory and the inrush of population into California caused by the gold excitement. For a time the impression prevailed throughout the country and even in Congress that almost any of the transcontinental trails over which wagons could be taken were feasible for a railroad. But by 1852 the choice had pretty well narrowed down to four or five main routes. Of these the line proposed by Whitney from Lake Michigan to the Columbia by way of the south pass, with a branch to San Francisco was the most northerly. It followed in the main course of one of the oldest and most traveled of the Western trails. Somewhat to the south of this, running between the 38th and 39th parallels, lay a line proposed by Senator Benton with its starting point at St. Louis and its terminus at San Francisco. Benton, who had long been interested in Western transportation, especially in its relation to Asiatic commerce, was known as a vigorous opponent both of Whitney's route and of his proposed land grants. In lieu of these the Missouri senator urged the route mentioned above and the construction of the road at government expense. Part of the route advocated by Benton had been explored by his indefatigable son-in-law, John C. Fremont, who had lost a number of his men and nearly perished himself in the undertaking. But even without the knowledge of the route obtained by Fremont, Benton was not one to be seriously disturbed by any lack of scientific data. Quote, There is a class of topographical engineers, he was want to declare, older than the schools and more unerring than the mathematicians. They are the wild animals, buffalo, elk, deer, and lobe bears, which traverse the forests, not by compass, but by instinct, that leads them always the right way to the lowest passes in the mountains, the shallowest fords in the rivers, and the shortest practical lines between remote points. The line Benton proposed crossed from the upper reaches of the Rio Grande to the grand and green river basin by way of Kuchitopa Pass, a pass Benton's opponents ridiculed as being the highest peak in the range, and continued almost due west until it reached the Mormon settlements of Parawan and Cedar City in southern Utah. Footnote, The elevation of this pass was 10,032 feet, in footnote. From this point, the road might either turn south some 200 miles along the course of the Virgin River, and then proceed westward to the Tahone or Walker Pass, or it could continue westward along its original course from the Mormon towns to the Sierra Nevada, skirting south along the base of these mountains until a pass should be found into the San Joaquin. Branches from the main railroad were to be built to Santa Fe, Salt Lake City, and the Columbia. Another transcontinental route, persistently urged and popular in many quarters, traversed the state of Texas to El Paso, followed the Gila to the Colorado, and thence crossed the desert to San Diego over the course followed by Colonel Emery in 1847. This is commonly known as the southern or 32nd parallel route, and was afterwards made use of in part by the first overland mail. A road along this line was naturally favored by the southern states because of what it meant to their economic development. The charge that slavery dictated this choice, though often made, is scarcely tenable. Entirely apart from sectional interests, the route had much to commend it because of its easy grades and almost complete freedom from snow. These advantages, however, were somewhat offset by its additional length, compared to the more direct routes and the desert territory through which it passed. In addition to these three main routes, the northern, the central, and the southern, there were a number of others of somewhat less importance. Among the most likely of these minor routes was one especially championed by Senator Gwyn of California. From San Francisco it ran down the San Joaquin, crossed the Sierra through Walker Pass, and continued along the 35th parallel to Albuquerque, New Mexico. Thence it turned south to a point near Santa Fe. A branch road was thence to be built along the old Santa Fe trail to Independence, but the main line, according to the plan, was to take a more direct course to Fulton, Arkansas. This terminus was to be the common meeting place of roads running to Memphis and New Orleans. Branch lines to Council Bluffs and Austin, Texas were also proposed at other points along the route, and in California a road was to be built up the Sacramento to Oregon. Still another proposed route followed Whitney's original line as far as the south past, but turned into California instead of Oregon, taking the course of the Humboldt River from a point near Salt Lake and crossing the Sierra by one of the northern passes. From this general summary it will be seen that railroad routes to California were plentiful enough on paper in the early 50s to satisfy the demands of every section. No intelligent choice could be made between them, however, from the data then available, since most of this was too general in character to satisfy the demands of railroad engineering. To meet this necessity for more accurate and detailed information, Congress at last authorized an official survey of the various routes. The work was begun in 1853 under the direction of Jefferson Davis, who was then Secretary of War. For more than two years it was carried on so vigorously and efficiently that nearly all the routes subsequently followed by transcontinental roads were carefully reconnoitred in their feasibility for railroad purposes pretty accurately determined. In addition to this work, for which they were specifically organized, the Survey Corps also gathered a vast store of material relating to the history, geology, botany, and ethnology of the Trans-Mississippi West. The surveys covered five principal routes. The most northerly lay between the 47th and 49th parallels. The second ran between the 41st and 42nd parallels. The third between the 38th and 39th parallels. The fourth along the course of the 35th parallel. And the fifth near the 32nd parallel. It will thus be seen that the operations of the reconnaissance parties extended from the Mississippi Valley to the Pacific, and almost from the Canadian line to the Mexican border. Except as their labors actually touched California, however, space cannot be given in the present volume to the exploration of these parties. Among the most important contributors to the success of the undertaking, as it related to California, were A. W. Whipple, R. S. Williamson, J. G. Park, H. L. Abbott, and E. G. Beckwith, the successor of the unfortunate Gunnison who was killed by the Indians on the Severe River. Beckwith's survey covered the region from Salt Lake to the upper end of the Sacramento Valley. After leaving Salt Lake, his party followed the familiar emigrant route along the Humboldt. But at its sink, instead of turning south to the Truckee, the company took a more northerly course mapping out two possible lines across the Sierra. One of these led through Madeline Pass, Round Valley, and the Pitt River Canyon. The other, a little further south, began the passage of the mountains at Honi Lake, crossed the summit by way of Noble Pass, and struck a tributary of the Sacramento known as Battle Creek. Both routes terminated at Fort Redding, whence the route down the level valley of the Sacramento was already sufficiently well known. Whipple's survey, on its part, covered much of the route afterwards adopted by the Atchison Topeka and Santa Fe. Leaving Fort Smith on the Arkansas, the line ran to Albuquerque, New Mexico, and thence to the Colorado, and by way of Zuni, Aztec Pass, and Bill Williams Fork, through a territory previously but little known. Leaving the Colorado a short distance above the needles, so-called because of certain mountain promontories, Whipple mapped out a feasible emigrant road to the Mojave. He then followed this stream until the old Spanish trail branched off to the Cajon Pass above San Bernardino. An examination of this pass, so long used by Santa Fe traders and fur hunters, showed it altogether practical for a railroad, and it afterwards became one of the great gateways for transcontinental traffic. The southern, or 32nd, parallel route had already been, in part, surveyed by Lieutenant Colonel Emery, first while serving in General Kearney's expedition, and afterwards as a member of the United States' Mexican Boundary Commission. But a more extended examination of the route was made by the surveys of 1853 and 1854. The line between the Red River and the Rio Grande was surveyed by Captain John Pope. From El Paso the work was carried westward by Lieutenant Park to the Pima villages on the Gila River in Arizona. Emery's survey of the boundary line was considered adequate to bridge the gap between this point and the Colorado. West of the Colorado the work was entrusted to Lieutenant Williamson. While the routes leading to California were thus being examined, other parties were making a reconnaissance of possible routes within the state itself. The most important work along this line was done by RS Williamson and his Chief Aid Lieutenant Park. The first task assigned Williamson was to discover a feasible route from the Gila River to San Francisco Bay, connecting with the 32nd and 35th parallel surveys east of the Colorado. In the course of this work Williamson made a careful examination of the mountain passes that led eastward from the lower San Joaquin Valley and of those through the Sierra Madre Range to the coast. Williamson's expedition left Benicia on July 10th, 1853, and entered the San Joaquin by way of Livermore Pass. Crossing to the east side of the valley the party took the usual route to the Delta of the Cahuilla where they secured the services of Alexander Gotti, the famous guide who had given such material aid to Fremont at an earlier date. Walker's pass was the first objective of the expedition. Contrary to popular impression, for this pass had long been described as the logical gateway through the Sierra, it was found to be wholly impractical for railway purposes on account of the difficulty of its westward approach. Because of this drawback and the position of the pass relative to the location that proposed routes, Williamson pronounced it the worst of all known passes in the Sierra Nevada's for a Transcontinental Railway. Though disappointed in the character of Walker's pass, Williamson was agreeably surprised to find that the Tahachapi offered a satisfactory outlet for a railroad from the San Joaquin to the Great Basin. He next examined the Tahon Pass but found it like Walker's very far from satisfactory. The Canyada de las Uvas, Great Vine Canyon, opening into the Tahon, furnished a much more practical route between the San Joaquin and the Mojave Desert. This pass and the Tahachapi Williamson accordingly favored in his report. Williamson's next problem was to discover an outlet through the Sierra Madre range which lies between the Mojave Desert and the Sea Coast. A wagon road had already been built from Los Angeles by way of San Fernando into the Valley of the Santa Clara. Then Sitt followed the sinuous course of the San Francisco Canyon, passed by Elizabeth Lake, and entered the Tahon. Upon examination, however, the San Francisco Canyon proved impractical for a railway, but east of the San Francisco Canyon lay another canyon which an extended survey showed to be well adapted to the desired road. This canyon, known to the Californians as Soledad, and now used by the main line of the Southern Pacific, Williamson called the New Pass. The New Pass furnished an outlet from the Mojave as far as the Santa Clara River. From this valley a line could be run without too great difficulty to Los Angeles. It was also believed that the course of the river would furnish a practical route for the extension of the road toward the Salinas Valley in San Francisco. Further east of Soledad Canyon, the Cajon Pass offered a gateway between San Bernardino with an easy connection to Los Angeles and the proposed Mojave River Colorado Line. One of the most important contributions to the surveys in California was made by Lieutenant Park, who examined the great San Gorgonio Pass lying between the two highest peaks of the Sierra Madre Range, Mount San Gorgonio or Greyback, and San Jacinto. This pass, pronounced by Williamson to be the best pass in the coast range, as indeed it easily is, furnished a feasible route from San Pedro and Los Angeles down the valleys, since known as Coachella and Imperial, to the junction of the Gila and the Colorado Rivers. It thus afforded a practical outlet for the proposed Southern or 32nd Prello route to the Pacific. It was also hoped that a line might be run from the Colorado by way of Werner's Pass, or through some similar gap in the mountain's farther south to San Diego, but upon examination neither Werner's nor any other pass in the locality proves suitable for the desired line. As a result of these investigations, Williamson concluded that a road built from the Mississippi to the mouth of the Gila would reach the Pacific most easily by way of San Gorgonio Pass, San Bernardino, and Los Angeles. If it were decided to make San Diego the terminus, the line could be extended south along the coast after leaving the San Gorgonio Pass. This was the only feasible plan of reaching San Diego, since the mountains made a more direct approach and practical. Three possible routes presented themselves for extending the road to San Francisco. The line might run northward along the Colorado from the Gila, then turn westward to the Mojave and into the San Joaquin by way of the Tahachapi. Or, having reached Los Angeles by the Cajon or San Gorgonio Pass, it might either be built northward along the coast or else be carried back to the Mojave Desert by way of Soledad Canyon and extended to the San Joaquin through the Tahachapi. Having reached the San Joaquin, the line could fight an outlet through the coast range by the Pachico Pass to San Jose. Lieutenant Park was in charge of the investigations covering the route along the coast from Los Angeles to San Francisco. His examination was carefully made, but the details cannot be entered into here. He thought the road might be built for twenty million dollars and pointed out the beneficial effect it would have upon the development of rich agricultural lands between Los Angeles and Monterey. A half century elapsed, however, before the Southern Pacific, following the Park's suggestions, completed this vital length between the North and South. The careful surveys of Williamson and Park in Southern California were duplicated in the northern part of the state the following year, 1855. Williamson was again put in charge of the work, but as Park was busy elsewhere, Lieutenant H. L. Abbott was detailed to act as chief assistant. The main object of this investigation was to discover a feasible route between the Sacramento Valley and Oregon, either by way of the Willamette River or the Deschutes. The Deschutes route involved a recrossing of the Sierra Nevada along the earlier line mapped out by Beckwith, and a survey of the region lying between the eastern outlet of Nobles Pass and the Klamath River. The course of this stream was then followed for some distance until a low range of hills allowed the party to cross to the Deschutes. The valley of this river, which was supposed to furnish an outlet to the Dalles, after a time proved impossible for railway purposes, and though a pass was afterwards found heading into the Willamette Valley, the route as a whole proved too difficult and the country too sterile to make the construction of a railroad practical. The second line marked out for survey between California and Oregon was much more favored by Williamson and Abbott. It tapped the rich mining regions of Shasta and Trinity counties, and ran through the fertile Umpqua, Rogue, and Willamette valleys. On this route the chief difficulty was presented by the mountainous country lying between Shasta City and Wairika. Indian troubles, however, unfortunately prevented a careful examination of much of the region. But Abbott's conjecture that the route would prove eminently practical upon further investigation was later verified by the construction of the Oregon and California Railway from San Francisco to Portland. The Pacific Railroad reports, which embodied the findings of Whipple, Gunnison, Stevens, Beckwith, and the rest, showed plainly enough that no insurmountable difficulty had been placed by nature in the way of a railroad to the west. But unfortunately for the immediate construction of such a road, the same reports show that it might follow at least four routes across the continent, thus keeping alive that sectional rivalry which had already proved such a serious impediment to the railway bill. The selection of the southern route by Secretary Davis as the most desirable for railway purposes did little to mend the situation. He was charged with pro- slavery and sectional motives, though his choice was wholly justified from the engineering and financial standpoint, and the battle between the various routes went on as vigorously and indecisively as before. In this contest, the southern route scored two important gains. One, the acquisition of the Butterfield Overland Mail is already been spoken of. The other, which transpired some years before the Overland Mail, while in fact the railroad surveys were still in progress, was the so-called Gadsden Purchase. This further acquisition of Mexican territory was urged because it was found that a railroad, following the general line of the 32nd Parallel, would be compelled at times to dip south of the border owing to topographical difficulties and run for part of its course through the state of Sonora. To keep the road wholly on American soil, President Pierce therefore sent Colonel James G. Gadsden of South Carolina to negotiate with Mexico for the desired territory. Gadsden, himself a railroad president and one of the earliest advocates of a line to the Pacific, had suggested in 1845 that its terminus be made either Mazatlan or San Francisco. He was an ardent enthusiast for the southern route and succeeded without great difficulty in securing Mexico's consent to the transfer of some 45,000 square miles, lying just south of Arizona and New Mexico, for $10 million. After a good day of debate, the treaty was ratified by the United States Senate and went into effect June 30th, 1854. Footnote. The Southern Pacific, for much of its course from Yuma to El Paso, now runs through this Gadsden Purchase. The treaty also provided for certain transit rights across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec. Footnote. While the federal government was thus concerned with the question of a railroad to the Pacific, the people of California were also busily engaged in agitation for the project. Their newspapers were continually harping upon it. Mass meetings and conventions were called to further the enterprise, and California congressmen and senators were made to feel that the chief end of their political life was to secure the enactment of a railroad bill. The state legislature similarly showed great enthusiasm for the enterprise. Much of this, expressed in oratory and memorials to Congress, did little good. But a few practical results were accomplished by other means. Most important of these was an examination of that portion of the Sierra Nevada lying between the American River and Carson Pass, for the purpose of constructing an immigrant road that later might serve as a railway route across the mountains. This investigation carried out under the surveyor general's orders by Sherman Day and George H. Goddard, whose name is still retained by one of the highest peaks in the Sierra, served materially to supplement the surveys previously made by the federal government. In California, however, as in the nation at large, sectional rivalries prevented general support of any one route. San Diego, Los Angeles, and San Francisco each had its ambition to become the railway center of the West, and the result was a frittering way of energy and urging local claims that might better have been spent in concerted action. This lack of harmony among Californians seriously weakened the railroad cause at Washington, and was one of the reasons for the long years of delay between the time of the completion of the surveys and the actual construction of the road. So in spite of a need which grew more urgent every year, various adverse factors continued to defeat the Pacific Railroad until the patience of the people of California was almost gone. In 1859 a San Francisco editor summed up this popular feeling in the following exasperated protest. Quote, if ever a people belonging to and forming part and parcel of a great nation were subject to a downright persecution from the government to which they owe allegiance, the people of California are the ones of all others that furnish the most prominent and striking example of such treatment. We are wholly at the mercy of a gang of political harpies who care no more for the interests of California than they do for those of the wild tribes of the interior of South Africa. If all that we have given to the world thus far, all the benefit that California has bestowed on the rest of the Union, and all that she has yet to become or to count for nothing in the estimation of the government, then let it be so understood, and let us cast about us and see what we can accomplish single-handed." If this editorial fairly represented public opinion on the coast, as it did without much question, then political necessity as well as economic expediency demanded the enactment of a railroad bill. The outbreak of the Civil War brought the issue to a climax. The federal government at last saw that a railroad must be built to California if California were to be kept within the Union. At the same time, since the southern route was eliminated from consideration because so much of it lay within Confederate territory, the question of the location of the road was greatly simplified. Succession and war thus cleared the way for the eagerly awaited but long-delayed Pacific Railroad.